THE DARKNESS WITHIN - PART THREE

I am Jonathan Palmer and this is my continuing confession, my final confession. As a former corporal in the US army I am more than familiar with death and the taking of another’s life, after all I drove a Humvee not a desk and wielded not a pen but a gun. Having served in Iraq I have no qualms as far as the killing of enemy combatants is concerned, unfortunately the nature of my foe had radically changed. Inducted into a secret military program to create a band of undercover über-assassins disguised as vicious serial killers I recently discovered that the enemy in question was not the civilian populace of a warring adversary but the dissident voices amongst our own population.

In an extreme example of life imitating art my commanding officer, Professor James Caleb, brought to terrible fruition the fictional research of Robert Louis Stevenson’s “Dr Henry Jekyll” and with the aid of a drug he’d developed “severed in me those provinces of good and ill which divide and compound man’s dual nature.” As Professor Caleb had explained:

‘The drug we have developed will enable you to draw upon your inner monster and yet operate completely separate to it. You will each be a modern day, real world Dr Jekyll… you will know nothing of the atrocities you commit… your physical appearance will temporarily change … you will have no memory of the important work we are about to undertake…’

As Dr Jekyll himself might have said, Caleb had “managed to compound a drug by which these powers [of good and ill] should be dethroned from their supremacy, and a second form and countenance substituted...”

Unlike Jekyll, whose “two natures had memory in common”, I had no knowledge of my second form’s existence and activities; it was only through unhappy coincidence, my viewing a TV programme discussing a “Jekyll and Hyde” scenario, that I first suspected I was truly a vicious killer.

Proof of this seemingly preposterous notion, insurmountable and damning, was furnished in part by my long time friend Dr Sally Medway, who put me under hypnosis, and latterly Professor Caleb himself, who I put under duress. Both meetings ended in murder, Sally’s by the uncontrollable hand of my own Mr Hyde and Caleb’s by the unflinching hand of my proper self. Although I had no control over Sally’s death I will never be free of remorse and self loathing; shooting the professor was brutal, cold blooded and just…and I don’t regret it for a second.

Something else I do regret however is these were not the only people I had killed since my apparent discharge from the army. Stimulated into action by Caleb’s satanic powder I had savagely executed three families in the Tri-State area. Two were innocents, butchered merely to provide a cover for the removal from life of the intended target, what Caleb described as “collateral damage”. The final family was that of Wendy Travis, guilty, in the self-interested eyes of my masters, of being a subversive voice. A journalist by trade she had asked too many of the wrong sort of questions; she, along with her husband and her two young children, had paid the ultimate price for her curiosity.

Unbeknown to me at its beginning my conversation with Caleb was relayed live to his headquarters along with his order that I and my girlfriend Caroline should be put to death, murdered by a second member of his team of killers. I raced the five hundred miles to the home of Caroline’s parents only to arrive too late; Caroline, her parents and her brother were dead, slain by a brutal killer. How they had known where to find her I cannot say for certain but I would hazard a guess we had been under surveillance ever since my return to civilian life. Too late to save them I was nonetheless in plenty of time to be arrested for their murder.

*******

‘You can see how this looks Jon,’ said FBI agent Walter Brown. ‘You were picked up at the murder scene of your girlfriend and her family, hundred’s of miles from where you live, which incidentally also happens to be where three identical murders have recently taken place. Add to that the fact only days ago a friend of yours was similarly butchered things aren’t looking too brilliant are they?’

‘Look,’ I replied wearily. ‘For the hundredth time I did not murder Sally Medway or anyone else in New York.’ Thanks to the pioneering work of the late Professor Caleb that was, in a manner of speaking, the truth. ‘That I cannot prove. As for Caroline, I loved her as much as life itself; I would not have harmed as much as a single hair on her head. You can see I was elsewhere at the time; you’ve got gas receipts, toll receipts, a motel bill. You cannot pin this on me.’

‘We’ll see about that,’ the agent stated grimly. ‘Officer, take Mr Palmer back to his cell. This is getting us nowhere.’

*****

As I sat on the hard concrete floor of my tiny, graffiti etched prison I reasoned Caroline’s murder had been a mistake. In the rush to erase me from the picture Caleb’s underlings had released their assassin either too soon or too poorly prepared; he’d carried out his assignment before I’d got there, perhaps mistaking Caroline’s brother for me. When next I saw Agent Brown mistaken identity of another sort was about to earn my release.

‘I want you to watch this surveillance video Jon. Tell me if you recognise the character leaving Dr Medway’s Office.’

The time stamp on the footage matched the time I had left Sally’s office, the bloodstained clothes were a match for those I had disposed of in the furnace in the basement of my apartment building, the person exiting the office dressed in those very same clothes was definitely no match for me.

‘Agent Brown,’ I said. ‘I could happily swear on my mother’s life I have never seen that man before.’

The subject of my oath was somewhat shorter than me, slimmer in the body yet heavier in the face. Ah that face, if ever a person’s facial appearance could encapsulate the essence of pure evil then this was it. Lust burned in his eyes, unsatisfied hunger defined the shape of his jaw, unbridled anger creased his Neanderthal brow.

‘I guess this lets you off the hook for Dr Medway,’ Brown grudgingly conceded. ‘And your alibi checks out as far as your girlfriend goes. We can’t link you to the other killings but my gut tells me you’re up to your neck in this somewhere along the line. There are too many unanswered questions; why for instance were the first three women brutally raped and worse while Caroline and Sally were not? On the one hand that makes you more of a suspect; on the other we know you didn’t kill Sally. Which suggests you’re not working alone; you got your accomplice to kill your lady friends, under firm instruction not to rape them just for old times’ sake.
‘Get out of here, you’re free to go,’ he barked. I’d stay close if I was you and I’d keep looking over my shoulder; we’ll be right behind you.’

*****

My relief at being released was nothing compared to that of knowing my darling Caroline and my dear friend Sally had not been raped, they’d been spared that indignity at least. I didn’t know for the life of me why Caroline was not sexually abused. As for Sally, it lit a small beacon of hope that even as the beast within me had brought his evil into my world I in turn had forced some mercy into his.

Taking note of Agent Brown’s warning to “keep looking over my shoulder” it was to avoid doing just that that I decided there and then what my next move should be. I took out a lease on a secluded farmhouse visible for miles, as would anyone approaching, be they FBI agent or military assassin. As far as the latter was concerned I had no doubt that as soon as their mistake had been recognised then another attempt, by either or both of my fellow graduates of Professor Caleb’s program, would be made on my life. Something told me I would not be so lucky next time.

Lucky? Some luck! My girlfriend was dead, murdered because of me. Sally too was dead, also murdered because of me and what’s more by me. Although I had no choice in her murder I had however chosen to become a killer for my country, not of soldiers but civilians and not in battle but in a savage, hell inspired bloodbath. For that reason I could not divorce myself from blame; Sally deserved that much.

What I needed now was more answers. From a practical viewpoint I needed to know the identities of the two men I had witnessed sitting either side of me when Sally’s hypnosis had dredged up the memories of that initial pep talk from Professor Caleb. If I could only recall their names I could feed that information to the FBI, providing them with alternative suspects and thereby earn myself some breathing space. I would of course have to fabricate an explanation as to why I suspected them but I would worry about that later. It was nigh on impossible the FBI would be able to do much, after all the same video that had expedited my release would work similarly in their favour. Their interest would however help me track them down; it was time to kill or be killed.

Leaving aside self preservation there was another question I needed answering, not to save my life but to save my soul; why had I agreed to join Professor Caleb’s murderous team?

My search for knowledge left me only one possible course; despite the terrible risks involved, risks I would do my utmost to nullify, I must be hypnotised once more. I prayed I would come out of the encounter with my answers….and the hypnotist with his life.

TO BE CONTINUED…..